Nuclear engineer Antoine Degas arrives in Saint-Lassou, a small and sleepy village, to persuade the inhabitants to approve the building of a new research centre and, eventually, a storage site for radioactive waste.

Nuclear engineer Antoine Degas arrives in Saint-Lassou, a small and sleepy village, to persuade the inhabitants to approve the building of a new research centre and, eventually, a storage site for radioactive waste. It's a huge project, he argues, promising jobs and plenty of money - a lifeline for the economically stagnant village. But he hasn't taken into account the vehement opposition of the mayor, Anna Lagrange, a German ecologist who owns an organic farm, who was only elected to the mayorship through lack of other candidates. Their stand-off will stir up plenty of tension in the village, beginning in Anna's own household, where her husband Florian, an unemployed engineer, is on Antoine's side.